In Response to Obedience

In John 14:15 Jesus says, “If you love me, you will obey what I command.” It really can’t be any simpler than that. The Christian life might be observed in the world by our words or actions or even our finances, but the true evidence of a genuine life in Christ is measured by God by one thing only - obedience. The most interesting thing about obedience is that no one, not any other person on earth, can know for sure if we are being obedient to God, aside from God Himself. Oh, we might know if someone is not obeying the Ten Commandments or refusing to help the poor or needy, but when it comes to specific tasks set before us to fulfill God’s purpose or plan for our individual lives…? No one else knows. That is between us and God. Kinda scary, huh? Reova knew her whole life was dedicated to God and her love for Him began at such an early age. It would have been enough for her to share that part of her story, and we would have been none the wiser. Thankfully, her struggles with obedience are a part of this story for all to see and learn from. From her devotion… Obedience is the natural outflow of love. We may not always understand why God is asking us to do a particular thing. Often we probably won’t understand why! The why is not important. We need only to understand who is speaking. And God, in His infinite knowledge and wisdom… He knows why! And that should be good enough for us with our finite knowledge and wisdom. We don’t need to understand, we just need to obey – Obedience first – understanding later. Some commands we only understand as we obey. Some commands we may never understand in this lifetime. In his book, My Utmost for His Highest, Oswald Chambers says, “Obedience precedes the promise. By obedience we see who God is. The promises of God are of no value to us until by obedience we understand the nature of God.” I am not talking about an obedience with a martyr or self-pity attitude that says, “Well, I’ve been obedience, so God owes me this…” We must have a higher level of obedience with an attitude of thanksgiving and joy as in spiritual worship. This obedience is done out of love and gratitude for God, feeling that God owes me nothing! It is the test of the depth of a personal relationship with The Lord. Sister Teresa of Avila once said, “The ability to bring our will into conformity with the will of God is the greatest thing we can accomplish on our spiritual journey.” But the end result of that obedience is a deeper, clearer understanding of God’s love for us and our love for Him. When we are obedient to God, we are really saying, “I love you.”